LISTS

I am a great fan of lists of everything. This time of year all sorts of people are making their lists of bests and worsts and most memorable everything. Then there are the predictions for 2007. I won't try to direct your attention to all of them but this from the Wall Street Journal is as illuminating as any of them.

As far as I am concerned the biggest news of 2006 was:

1. The repudiation of the Iraq War by the American voter; and
2. The failure of the United Nations to .....well, you name it, but Darfur is as good a place to start as any; and
3. The declining state of the US fisc, including the deficit, the fall of the dollar and the creeping feeling that the sovreign credit rating is about to take a tumble.

But here, look at the Journal stories:

What is it about the mix of Google and jets that readers find so alluring?

In 2005, the second-best-read story at WSJ.com reported the news that Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page had purchased their own Boeing 767 jet. This year, a story about the same jet1 -- this time involving a legal dispute over the renovation of the plane -- topped our best-read list.

Of course, it wasn't all Google all the time. Other topics sparked your interest over the past year.
Election coverage took three of the top 15 slots, including a not-so-prescient op-ed column from Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee until January 2007, making the case that his party would "make history"

2 by retaining both houses of Congress. Alas, history was made, but it was the Democrats who won the Senate and the House.

The troubled housing market showed up twice in the list, as readers identified with owners and builders suffering from stagnant or dropping prices in one story

3. And in another they clicked, perhaps hopefully, on a piece entitled, "Is the Worst Over for the Housing Bust?"

4 Breaking news had its day, particularly with the unexpected death of Ken Lay

5, former Enron chairman, who suffered a heart attack after his conviction but before his appeals could be heard. Similarly, many of you relied on our constantly updated Mideast Crisis Tracker

6 during the Israel-Lebanon conflict last summer. Then there are the stories that don't fit neatly into any category. Carol Hymowitz's provocative column entitled "Any College Will Do"

7 examined how corporate success can come to those who attended state schools, not just elite private schools. And as in previous years, readers loved to click on our annual roundup of Super Bowl ads

8 especially as we provided you a chance to vote on which you liked most and least. (Showing what a bunch of positive thinkers you are, 50% more readers voted on the "best" ad than on the "worst" one.)

And sometimes, the most valued parts of the site are where we simply give you raw data or information. Many of you wanted to read the entire "Peanut Butter Manifesto"

9 written by Yahoo executive Brad Garlinghouse. Even more of you delved into the regularly updated Battleground Poll

10 we published, in cooperation with Zogby Interactive, on the most contested Senate and gubernatorial races.

Traffic on any Web site is determined by all kinds of factors -- how the stories are played on the home page, how long they are prominently featured, and whether blogs or other sites link in. (Those third-party links turned out to be especially crucial to the readership of the Google jet stories.) Most-popular lists are often somewhat self-fulfilling as well, since a well-read story winds up high on the list, which encourages more readership, which keeps it high on the list, and so on. Also, our tracking system covers only stories and doesn't include blogs, interactive graphics, photo galleries or videos.

WSJ.com editors and staff are always eager to know what you find most interesting. The data help a great deal, but we're also interested in more personal contact. So if you have additional thoughts about what makes content compelling, please let me know at b.grueskin@wsj.com


Bill Grueskin is managing editor of The Wall Street Journal Online

Top 15 Most-Read Articles of 2006

1) Lawsuits Fly Over Google Founders' Big Private Plane12, 7/07/06
2) Which Travelers Have 'Hostile Intent'? Biometric Device May Have the Answer13, 8/14/06
3) Couric Hits the 'Muted' Button14, 8/05/06
4) Mideast Crisis Tracker15, 9/10/06
5) Republicans See Edge From Early Voting16, 10/31/06
6) 'Republicans Will Make History'17, 9/22/06
7) Clever Gags Score High on Super Bowl Ads18, 2/06/06
8) Lay's Legacy: Corporate Change -- But Not the Kind He Expected19, 7/06/06
9) A Wii Workout: When Videogames Hurt20, 11/25/06
10) A New Breed of Watchdog for Election Day21, 11/06/06
11) Is the Worst Over for the Housing Bust?22, 11/20/06
12) 'Any College Will Do'23, 9/18/06
13) Housing Slump Proves Painful for Some Owners and Builders24, 8/23/06
14) Yahoo Memo: The 'Peanut Butter Manifesto'25, 11/18/06
15) Moguls of New Media26, 7/29/06

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